anastasia grib the symbolic repertoire of the qur’anic ......tablet (al-lawḥ al-maḥfūẓ),...

Anastasia GribThe Symbolic Repertoire of the Qur’anic Board in Islamic AfricaAbstract

The Qur’anic board is a central object in the material culture of the Qur’an in the local Islamic centres of Africa. The board features ornaments and calligraphy, a symbolic language which one needs to learn and interpret. This article provides a transcription of the symbolic code of the Qur’anic board based on the study of 124 samples from the Brooklyn Museum, the Gallery of Sam Fogg, the Musée du quai Branly, and other col-lections. The boards are dated to the end of the 13th and 14th centuries Hijri/19th and 20th centuries CE and represent several regional groups: Mali, Morocco, Mauritania, Nigeria, Sudan, Ethiopia, Somalia and Senegal. A functional typology of the boards is discussed, i.e., festive, training, magical, and healing boards; to this a classification is added that proceeds from the consideration of material, form, ornamentation, and script. Four different types of ornamentation are identified: architectural, geometric (cosmic symbols), carpet, and figurative. Some ornamental motifs can be described as an ex libris connecting the board to an important local centre or shrine; among such motifs are those with pre-Islamic origin. Two boards are localized to the Cere-mony Mountains in Northern Nigeria; they feature anthropomorphic and zoomorphic images and their iconography traces back to Neolithic rock graffiti. Playing a crucial role in initiation, the Qur’anic board is a symbol of masculinity, as exemplified by the wedding ceremony mba and the Qur’anic school graduation fest saukar fari in Nigeria.

1 Qur’anic Board as an Emblem of the Material Culture of the Qur’an

The Material Culture of the Qur’an (MCQ) refers to artefacts and their associated prac-tices focused on the Holy Qur’an and its representations. I distinguish between three domains of the MCQ. The domain of primary objects includes Qur’anic boards (QBs) and manuscripts. The domain of secondary objects includes architectural surfaces, wooden objects, pottery, calabashes, textiles, and rock graffiti featuring a pictorial

This article emerged from the Heidelberg Collaborative Research Center 933 “Material Text Cultures. Materiality and Presence of Writing in Non-Typographic Societies”. The CRC 933 is financed by the German Research Foundation (DFG).

DOI 10.1515/9783110417845-007, © 2016 Anastasia Grib, Published by De Gruyter.This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 License.

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image of the QB. The domain of ritual refers to the reified existence of the sacred text: primary objects participate in this domain directly, whereas secondary objects point to a ritual function. The third domain involves the use of the Qur’anic text and of its symbolic representations (in the form of ‘false calligraphy’), as well as the participa-tion of the QB in the following ritual activities and objects: magic, sorcery, talismans, and various protections against the evil eye.

In this paper I attempt a decoding of the symbolic language of the MCQ in the local Islamic centres of West and North Africa, where the most striking example of the MCQ is the Qur’anic board allo (pl., alluna, from Arabic al-lawḥ). The board is used exten-sively: it is the major emblem of the malam’s profession and is used by students in Qur’anic schools in learning Arabic grammar, the holy text of the Qur’an, and the art of calligraphy.

The background of the Qur’an board is the transhistorical concept of the Hidden Tablet (al-Lawḥ al-Maḥfūẓ), the Mother of the Book (‘Umm al-Kitab), or proto-Qur’an. Islamic tradition holds that Allah had inscribed upon this tablet the totality of His decrees concerning creation.1

Until recently, the board was the main writing material for teaching the Qur’an, Arabic literacy, and calligraphy in Qur’anic schools (khalwa, muhadra, makarantar allo, etc.) and madrasa (madrasah, pl. madāris) throughout Sub-Saharan Africa. The majority of such local traditions in Pakistan, Malaysia, Iran, and various regions of Central Asia were lost in the course of the 15th century Hijri/20th century CE after the introduction of modern schooling systems, but in Africa use of the board has per-sisted in Islamic learning and can still be observed in, e.g., Mali (Timbuktu), Sudan (Umdurman), Nigeria (Kano, Sokoto, Marghi, Zaria, Bauchi), Mauritania (Tichit, Oualata, Ouadan, Chinguetti), Algeria, Morocco (Rabat, Fes), Guinea, Somalia, Ethi-opia (Harar), the Comoro Islands, and Senegal. Below I classify the boards in accord-ance with their regional variations.

1.1 Local Traditions

Islamic learning and writing centres exist all over North and West Africa, so I did not limit my investigation to one particular locality. The geographical scope has been

1 On the Hidden Tablet Allah has written all the destinies of His creatures: “For every term there is a book prescribed; Allah erases out whatever He pleases and writes (whatever He pleases); and with Him is the Mother of the Book” (13:39); “Nay, it is the glorious Qur’an, in the Guarded/Hidden Tablet” (85:22). In the Qur’an, the plural form of the word “tablet”, alwah, refers to the Tablets of Moses.


The Symbolic Repertoire of the Qur’anic Board in Islamic Africa 245

deliberately broadened to allow a comparative examination of the objects under dis-cussion.

Being a synthetic cultural product, a QB displays characteristics of regional Islam found in a variety of local practices—in contrast to the so-called ‘normative Islam’ of the Central Islamic Lands. In Nigeria, Mauritania, Mali and Sudan, there are multi-religious, multicultural communities that have preserved the tradition of copying the Qur’an. Here one finds permanent and itinerant schools known variously as makarantar allo (in Nigeria), muhadra (in Mauritania) and khalwa (in Sudan). The schools are established and run by local or itinerant scholars through whom the tra-dition of sacred text copying is largely preserved and disseminated. Students write the assigned Qur’anic verses on a flat surface of a wooden board; at the end of the exercise they wash the text off upon receiving their malam’s (teacher’s) permission. The water is often collected and used for ritual purposes and is therefore treated with care and piety. At the same time, the Qur’anic board is an integral element in indige-nous initiation (male initiation and wedding) ceremonies—in parallel to the board’s use in Qur’anic schooling, where it functions to initiate a child into the Muslim faith.

One of the most intriguing traditions is found among the Hausa. The common occupation of a Hausa malam is that of a craftsman, artist, and scribe simultaneously, which influences their unique school of writing. The calligraphic tradition of Hausa in Northern Nigeria represents a distinctive version of the Sūdānī Kūfī.

In Mauritania, there are two scripts for copying the Qur’an, one traditional and one modern. The Sūdānī script is widespread, but the most developed and perfected script today is the Andalusī (of the Maghribian branch, see below).

In Sudan, Qur’anic schools are commonly called khalwa and the boards are known as loah. Such schools are usually ruled by sufi sheikhs. For example, khalwa in Omdawanban is a

religious institution that today welcomes more than 1250 students from Sudan, Chad, Cameroon, and Nigeria. It takes from three to six years to acquire a perfect knowledge of the Qur’an and to master written Arabic […]. The children learn to write Arabic for the first time on the wooden tablet using a tube of sugar cane filled with an ink made of charcoal or soot.2

Wooden boards are used for writing lessons and copies of the Qur’an are used for reading.3 In Sudan, as in some other regions, one also finds khalwa for girls.4

2 Cifuentes 2008, 50–59, esp. 58.3 Cifuentes 2008, 56.4 “In addition to the learning and practicing of religion, the women are trained in health care, nutri-tion, cooking, sewing, and handicrafts in order to help a living” (Cifuentes 2008, 56).


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1.2 The Script and the Ornament

The Qur’anic boards and the manuscripts share similar types of calligraphy. The majority of the boards discussed in this article exhibit several variations of the Sūdānī hand (the most prominent is the Hausa ductus); most of the rest feature the Andalusī hand, and a few are in the ‘Ifrīqī hand.

With regard to the genealogy of the script, the West-African tradition is an off-shoot of the Kūfī school.5 The very term Kūfī thus pertains to the shape of letters and the diacritical marks that are representative of the Maghribī system of writing. These diacritics differ from those of the Middle-Eastern system by: (1) letter ف (fā’), which is marked by a single dot in the underscript; (2) letter ق (qāf), which has only one dot in the superscript; and (3) letter ض/ ص (ṣāḍ/ḍād), which doesn’t have a final tooth. While remaining the principle Qur’anic script, the Maghribian branch of sacred Kūfī has been modified into a cursive hand, and beyond that, into a false calligraphy (observed as an architectural decoration). The ‘Demonumentalised Kūfī’ is the result of this evolution; it is still practiced today as the script of the Qur’anic board.

There is a whole set of distinctions between the Maghribī styles (in the concrete geo-graphic application of the term, the hands of North Africa and Spain) and the West African school. Such differences can be observed both in the graphic features of the script and in the iconography of the ornament. West African styles are characterized by sharp angularity and geometrical shape, whereas the Maghribī ones have ligatures and plasticity. This difference is very much apparent in the decoration of the Qur’anic boards. In terms of ornamentation the distinguishing characteristic of the Maghrib-ian Qur’anic tradition is the predominance of the Islamic and Arabic features. On the other hand, in the remote parts of Africa where indigenous cultures prevail, the board and the manuscript have switched roles: compared with the manuscript, the board is a more potent object, both semantically and ritually.

‘Ifrīqī (fig. 1) is an early and more simple version of the Maghribī style; it has been used on QBs in the past, but very randomly. The script is characterized by angularity and flatness, and the proportions are also random. Different modifications of ‘Ifrīqī have assimilated with the Spanish Andalusī.

Andalusī (fig. 2) is an elegant cursive type of Maghribī. It is commonly used on Qur’anic boards in North Africa, especially in Morocco, Mauritania, and Algeria. The script has the following characteristics:1. final letters ض/ ص (ṣāḍ/ḍād) and س (sīn) sometimes have an extended shape2. lines are not sharp but rather waved and curled

5 Cf. Bivar 1959, 324–349; Hassan 1992; Blair 2008, 59–75; and Mohameden Ould Ahmad Salem, cal-ligrapher from Mauritania, with whom I corresponded by e-mail.



Fig. 1: Fragment of the Mukhtalitah of Sahnun from Qairawan, 11th century CE (MSS303 fol. 8b–9a) © Nasser D. Khalili Collection.

Fig. 2: Fragment of a Qur’anic manuscript from Morocco, 18th century CE (Qur. 149, part I, fol. 157b–158a) © Nasser D. Khalili Collection.


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Fig. 3: Fragment of a Qur’anic manuscript, end of the 19th century CE (Qur.109 fol. 2b) © Nasser D. Khalili Collection.



3. final forms of the letters ق، ف، ن ،ى (yā’, nūn, fā’, qāf) frequently have no diacritics.

The text is visually divided into groups of verses: every five āyāt are stamped with the pattern known as khamisa (or khamsa); every ten āyāt are marked with the ‘ashira (‘ashra). Sūdānī style (fig. 3) is widespread in the area of Western Sudan; one of the most spectacular variations is the Hausa ductus which is also the style of the Hausa malams (s. malam, pl. malamai) in Northern Nigeria.The Qur’anic text is written in dark brown or black ink (usually made from charcoal), illuminations are polychromatic. Malams use natural colours such as red, yellow, blue, and green. Diacritics are executed in a different colour, whereas vocalization is done by means of short horizontal strokes. The majority of the manuscripts and a number of boards contain colourful round medallions (fig. 4) as well as sajjāda (a prayer rug ornament, which stands symbolically for sajda, prostra-tion); these are painted on the margins with the help of compasses.

At the beginning of each new section of a manu-script there is an ‘unwān (or ‘carpet page’) called zayyana (figs. 5–6). A typical zayyana consists of a rectangular textile ornamental panel featuring colourful geometri-cal patterns. Zayyana is also a characteristic feature of the festive QB. In the Sudanic tradition the same type of ornament is called charafa.6 Sūra headings are written in a different colour, usually red, and are marked off by a frame.

Among marginal signs one finds ḥizb—division into sixty sections, as well as further subdivisions: nisf (1/2 of ḥizb) (fig. 6), rub‘ (1/4), and thumn (1/8), following the numerical meaning of the letters nūn, bā’, and thā’ (fig. 8). Each verse is marked off by a pattern of three dots forming a trefoil (red or yellow with a red outline) with a short ‘antenna’ on the top. Every five verses are divided

6 Thus, in Sudan, in the khalwa Qur’anic schools, “to complete their education, students must write a passage from the Qur’an in their best script and draw a holy illustration on the wooden tablet. This charafa is presented to the master during the last few days of schooling” (Cifuentes 2008, 59).

Fig. 4: Fragment of a Qur’anic manuscript from Western Sudan, end of the 19th century CE (Qur.109 fol. 3a) © Nasser D. Khalili Collection.


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Fig. 5: Fragment of a Qur’anic manuscript from Western Sudan, end of the 19th century CE (Qur.109 fol.10) © Nasser D. Kahlili Collection.

Fig. 6: Fragment of a Qur’anic manuscript from Western Sudan, end of the 19th century CE (Qur.110 fol.1b-2a) © Nasser D. Kahlili Collection.



by letter hā’ modified into a tear-shaped loop. Every ten verses are divided by a double round medallion with three or four dots or strokes inscribed within the text, or sometimes with a small wheel-shaped medallion on the margin.

There are variations within the Hausa tradition: some scripts are more cursive, whereas other scripts are more monumen-tal and can be described as heavy and colourful. The common script of Kano is almost square; the text is a lot denser than in the Maghribī Qur’ans of North Africa; letters are compact and much higher and heavier; lines are fat-faced and steady. One may regard this style as a version of Hausa ductus.7

There are notable differences between boards and manu-scripts as regards illumination. Qur’anic boards have no mar-ginal markers. Along with the strong tradition of zayyana in Nigeria and of ‘unwān in other areas, there is a greater variety of ornamentation on the Maghribian and West-African boards. For example, festive boards from Morocco feature a whole series of ornaments: colourful solar ornaments with geometric patterns, architectural ornaments portraying a mosque, various kinds of floral ‘unwāns. Such decorations usually cover the entire surface of the board on one side; on the other side the calligra-pher inscribes a text from the Qur’an, or some other ornamen-tal composition. Since Qur’anic boards differ from one African region to another, the type of this decoration may also provide clues for attribution.

2 Analysing the Symbolic Repertoire of the QB

2.1 The Dialect Approach

In my study, ornament and calligraphy have been analysed by applying the ‘Dialect Approach’ to Islamic art. Just like the Arabic language, one may talk about the clas-sical, or ‘standard’, language of Islamic art and about its regional ‘dialects’ related

7 Ductus is “a visually recognizable aspect of a concrete graphic tradition […]. In the domain of the Arabic script, there are clearly several graphic modifications that do not always coincide with the ‘script’ in the traditional classification.” (Dobronravin 1999, 8;the translation of the quote from Rus-sian is mine).

Fig. 7: Fragment of a Qur’anic manuscript (Qur.0110 fol. 65b) © Nasser D. Khalili Collection.


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primarily to ethnic background. I choose to call the calligraphic traditions of West and North Africa the West- and North-African interpretations of Kūfī (including in the term Kūfī both the script and the ornament). I also replace the two commonly used academic terms arabesque and geometric ornament with the term ‘motif-chain’.8 The classification goes by genre: architectural motif-chain, textile motif-chain, cal-ligraphic motif-chain, etc. Motif-chain has a composite nature: it is organized around a particular pictogram such as tree, column, tent, etc.; it also features a subject line, e.g., zoomorphic, cosmogonic, vegetative, etc. An additional element of classifica-tion proceeds from the consideration of individual artistic elements such as straight or curved line, zigzag, triangle, circle, dot, grid, leaf, fruit, etc. The character of the ornaments is determined by the object’s purpose, usage, and ownership. Ornaments may speak of the board’s provenance in a certain place; it may relate to the owner’s personal need such as healing; or it may be part of a training board used in a Qur’anic school. The depictive canon of the board can be symbolically transcribed assuming one reads the object from the perspective of the time and the place of its (1) creation, (2) editing, (3) storing, and (4) interpretation/use.

2.2 Typology of the QB

The functional typology of the Qur’anic board distinguishes between festive, training, magical, and healing boards. The function determines the format of the board and the presence or absence of ornamentation.

Festive boards usually contain the first Sūra al-Fātiha and a short excerpt from the second Sūra al-Baqara. This symbolises the completion of the program of study of the Qur’an, from the first Sūra to the final one. The student starts with Fātiha; after that he/she moves to the very last Sūra, gradually working his/her way back toward the beginning.

Boards are vertical or square-shaped, with or without a handle.There are several types of ornament:

– carpet type (geometrical, textile)—zayyana (Hausa type); – architectural type—architectural motifs or the image of a mosque: the so called

reduced Temple image; – cosmogonic type (geometrical); – floral type; – figurative type, characterized by zoomorphic and anthropomorphic images.

8 I have borrowed the two terms, ‘motif-chain’ and ‘chronotope’ (below), from Mikhail Bakhtin’s dis-cussion of the cultural roots of the Western European novel, see Bakhtin 1984; Emerson/Holquist 1981.



Certain ornamental motifs can be described as an ex libris connecting the board to an important local centre or shrine; among such motifs are those with pre-Islamic (indigenous) origin.

The most striking Qur’anic board tradition is that of the Hausa in Northern Nigeria. There are several types of Hausa allo, including:

– a draft allo for practice (pl. alluna, study boards): the board allows corrections of both the text and the ornament

Fig. 8: Hand writing copy of the Marks from a Nigerian Qur’an C-1689 (Institute of Oriental Manu-scripts, Russian Academy of Sciences, St. Petersburg).


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– allo zayyana: this board is of particular importance as it becomes the graduation certificate from the Qur’anic school (during the saukar fari festival), and is also used as a symbol of male initiation.

2.2.1 Imago Templi

Among the ornamentations of the Qur’anic boards especially from Nigeria and Morocco, there are versions of Imago Templi, the image of the sacred space/place. Imago Templi appears in the MCQ in different stages of Islamic history and in various localities. The tradition goes back to early Kufic manuscripts with the ‘reduced Temple image’, or the genizah (place of storage) image; in a number of instances it functions as a colophon, a symbolic place-tag marking the location of the manuscript.9

On the Moroccan boards, the most common elements of the Imago Templi are the following: column, lamp, niche, tree (the tree of life in Paradise), and arcade. There are also schematic depictions of the mosque drawn as an architectural profile or a plan. On the Nigerian boards (Hausa and Fulani), the Imago Templi appears in the form of zayyana or a mosque plan; on the boards from Marghi it reproduces the graffiti from the sacred caves (such as scorpions, snakes, hunters), or symbolizes a wedding tent.

Because the Qur’anic board plays an important role in initiation (e.g., in mba and saukar fari ceremonies), this ritual function is always marked by an ornament; for example, zayyana stands symbolically for Imago Templi. Salah Hassan has provided a description of the saukar Qur’ani (or saukar fari), the graduation ceremony popular among the Hausa.10 During this ceremony, a group of students parades bearing a happy graduate of the makarantar allo school on their shoulders. The new gradu-ate is awarded a decorated festive board (allo zayyana), which his family has pre-or-dered from a professional malam. Other students are carrying their own boards: these alluna have no ornamentation or any other decoration since they are used in everyday study and practice. In this festival there are plenty of participants, but only one boy is celebrated. The tradition of Qur’anic school graduation festivals originated in North Africa and occurs all over West Africa. Such festivals are essentially male initiations, as is the case in Gambia (the nau mini ceremony) or Sierra Leone.11 These ceremonies are of comparable meaning and symbolism even as they may differ in details.

9 Grib 2009b, 110–125.10 Salah Hassan 1992, 95.11 Hassan 1992, 99.



The genizah image is featured on the ‘Brooklyn Board’ (see below). The decorations on this board allow its place of origin to be identified: the sacred caves in Marghi.12 In these caves, the wedding/engagement ceremony mba takes place, during which various objects of male prestige are paraded.

2.3 Surface, Body, and Iconic Symbolism

The symbolic repertoire of the QB accumulates the artistic language of African Islam; in particular, it consists of 1) images and symbols common for the decoration of the boards; 2) the board itself and its features when the board is used as a symbol; and 3) the functioning of the board.

I identify three symbolic aspects of the Qur’anic board: – surface symbolism: the symbols on the surface of the board, such as the various

ornamental motifs and script; – body symbolism: the overall shape of the board, which often has anthropomor-

phic features; – iconic symbolism: the use of the Qur’anic board as a pictorial icon in a different

material context; particularly, all the instances when the pictorial image of the board appears on other surfaces (such as stone, textile, calabashes, etc.).

The first aspect of the symbolic repertoire of the QB emerges from a consideration of the board’s surface (surface symbolism). There is a semantic unity between Qur’anic manuscripts and boards in this particular aspect. Both use similar sets of ornaments, though the board exhibits a much wider spectrum. For example, the zayyana orna-ment, which is common to the manuscripts and the boards, is a modification of the famous ‘unwān, or ‘carpet page’.

Surface symbolism is built from the following artistic elements:1. basic motif-chains: architectural, textile, calligraphic;2. alternative motif-chains: floral/vegetative, animal, cosmological, ritual and the

Temple;3. motifs: arch, column, niche, palmette, etc.;4. units: direct line, waving line, zigzag, circle, square, triangle, point, vase, spiral

flower, net, border, etc.The second aspect of the symbolic repertoire of the board relates to its body sym-bolism. There are various ‘bodily’ features and functions of the Qur’anic board. The board is often shaped anthropomorphically: it consists of a head, a neck, two shoul-ders, a body, and two feet (fig. 10). This is everything but the hands, since the board

12 Grib 2009a, 23.


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and the copyist (malam) have but a single pair of hands between them. Moreover, one is not allowed to flip the board over, making it even more ‘human’. Also in the Hausa tradition, one finds a special type of ‘legless’ board, the gurgun allo.13

13 See Hassan 1992, 157. I am grateful to Dr. Abubakar Sule (University of East Anglia), a Hausa native and a graduate of a Nigerian makarantar allo, for the following personal communication: “‘Gurgu’ refers to disable disabled?? as in without leg. A lot of boards with sharp convex arches and elongated legs end up that way”.

Fig. 9: Qur’anic board from Western Sudan N° 9568 © Sam Fogg.



Fig. 10: Mosque in Zaria, decorated by Musa Yola (taken from Moughtin 1985, 130).

Fig. 11: a–c. Wedding textiles (taken from http://www.adireafricantextiles.com).


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In addition to the body, the ‘skin’ of the board is very important, which is to say its ornamented surface. Various symbols used in the ornamentation (e.g., ‘the Hand of Fatima’, the ‘leper hand’) are bodily allegories full of magical meaning. Being an ini-tiation object, the board communicates important changes in the life of the body. One can also include in this aspect the anthropomorphic and zoomorphic figures that may be inscribed on the board—given the fact that such figures carry distinct gender char-acteristics.

In sum, body symbolism is built from:1. body-shaped parts of the board;2. gurgun allo;3. allo zayyana/charafa: a special board for the graduation ceremony (saukar fari/

walīma khatmil-Qur’an) at the end of the student’s time at the Qur’anic school. This board functions as a graduation certificate.

The third aspect of the symbolic repertoire of the Qur’anic board is iconic symbolism. The pictorial image of the Qur’anic board can be seen on an architectural surface, e.g., above the portal of a mosque (fig. 10).14 In wedding textiles (fig. 11a–c), the image of the QB stands symbolically for ‘man’. On the other hand, among the Fulani, the cala-bashes featuring images of festive objects and, in some cases, engraved zodiac tablets (including four Qur’anic boards), relate the idea of ‘femaleness’ (fig. 12).15

14 As described by Kirk-Green 1963, 18: “Hausa walls may show the Koranic emblems of the slate (allo) […] and the satchel for carrying the Holy Koran (gafaka).”15 Blackmun Visonа 2001, 102.

Fig. 12: Engraved zodiac tablet (taken from Blackmun Visona 2001).



Fig. 14: Cave close to Songo village, Mali © Kirill Prokhorov.

Fig. 13: Pictorial representation of the Qur’anic board (taken from Le Quellec 2004).


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Finally, one can find the pictorial representation of the QB (fig. 13) or of a Qur’anic satchel among the cave graffiti in Nigeria and Mali (fig. 14).16 Studies of such caves take note of a special engagement ceremony celebrated there. During the ceremony various images are painted upon the walls and various sacred objects (usually signi-fiers of male prestige) are brought inside. The ceremony is known by the name mba. The boys (who are 14–17 years old) ‘draw on the walls simple figures of weapons, shields, and pectiniform animals, especially mounted horses’.17 As I have proposed elsewhere,18 along with the weapons and the musical instruments, boys may bring other valuable objects such as Qur’anic boards into the caves.

3 Review of the CollectionsThe classification that follows is based on my analysis of Qur’anic boards from the fol-lowing collections: Brooklyn Museum (New York); the Gallery of Sam Fogg (London), and the Musée du quai Branly (Paris). The total number of boards is 124. In addition, I have examined a number of boards from the Smithsonian Institute (Washington, D.C.), a private collection in Boston, the Nasser D. Khalili collection (London) and the photo-archive of Salah M. Hassan (Cornell University), as well as boards from the Peter the Great Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography (The Kunstkamera of St. Petersburg). All the boards were manufactured in the first half of the 14th century Hijri/late 19th and early 20th century CE, and represent various regions of West Africa and the Maghrib.

Each board has been analysed based on the following characteristics: script, decoration, form, colour, and ink. The resulting classification is presented by region, collection, and type of ornament used. In my typology, the boards can be grouped as follows: decorated and non-decorated (those containing only a text or individual letters); training and festive boards (the latter are used as certificates of graduation from the Qur’anic school).

Qur’anic manuscripts and ritual objects with ‘magic’ ornaments have provided additional information and were used as supporting material.

The largest collection of boards belongs to the Musée du quai Branly; it includes 114 samples. Another important collection was exhibited in 2007 at the Sam Fogg Gallery in London.19 Consisting of only nine boards, the collection featured clearly distinguishable regional types, which has helped me to arrive at my own classifica-

16 See Grib 2009a, 22–34.17 Le Quellec 2004, 74.18 See Grib 2009, 22–34.19 Islam in Africa, An Exhibition on View: 9–26 October 2007 (London: Sam Fogg).



tion of the Qur’anic boards. For the present article, I have made a selection of the most representative samples of the regional types.

While Sam Fogg has exhibited four regional types of Qur’anic boards, the Mau-ritanian and Malian samples from the collection of the Musée du quai Branly look different; one board from Mali (at the Musée du quai Branly) has the same shape as the boards from Southern Morocco and Mauritania in Sam Fogg’s collection, but it is turned upside down.

The most common ornaments painted on the boards I have studied belong to cos-mogonic and textile motif-chains: this is the palmette as well as other solar symbols such as Nigerian ‘Northern knot’. The same is true for Qur’anic manuscripts: African Qur’ans also feature a palmette, but here the design carries a somewhat different meaning, being known as the ‘leper hand’, or ‘the Hand of Fatima’, the sign of pro-tection from evil.

Two objects present a special case as they do not fit into my main regional classifica-tion of Qur’anic boards. The first board is from the Brooklyn Museum in New York; the second is from the Musée du quai Branly in Paris. Both boards feature zoomor-phic and anthropologic images of similar provenance. I discuss these two boards in a special section below.

3.1 Boards from the Collection of Sam Fogg (fig. 9; figs. 15–19)

The Sam Fogg Gallery has exhibited nine Qur’anic boards, the images and the descrip-tion of which have been published in a catalogue.20 These boards are examples of four regional types:

– Western Sudan (or Nigeria): N° 95682, N° 12303—two boards from the thirteenth century Hijri/nineteenth century CE

– Southern Morocco and Mauritania: N° 11987001, N° 9305—two boards from the first half of the fourteenth century Hijri/early twentieth century CE

– Somalia: N° 9306, N° 12304, N° 1770—three boards from the first half of the four-teenth century Hijri/early twentieth century CE

– Ethiopia: N°12301, N° 9569—two boards from the first half of the fourteenth century Hijri/early twentieth century CE

Type 1 (fig. 9): The board has a wider surface, which makes it more convenient to write the Qur’anic text. The base features two legs; in a number of instances it is concave. The handle has a horn- or a crescent-like top; in a number of instances the top rep-

20 Ibid.


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licates the curve of the base. The top is fashioned from a different material such as leather, wood, or ivory; it attaches to the handle or directly to the board. The shape of the board is square-like and symmetrical. There are no holes in the handle, but it is nicely made, with a high degree of accuracy. The first type is representative of the boards from Western Sudan, and is also known as Nigerian.

In Nigeria and Sudan, festive boards are very popular. These boards are rather elegant and may be used during initiation ceremonies. Among the distinguishing characteris-tics of the festive board is the polished surface of the wood, use of dark black/brown-ish ink, text written in Western Sūdānī script, and the zayyana ornament.

Type 2 (figs. 15–16): The board is more narrow and elongated in shape; occasionally, the shape is symmetrical. The base is smoothly curved. The handle is long, thin, and jagged-edged, and has a hole for hanging. This type is representative of Southern Morocco and Mauritania.

Types 3 and 4: These two types include study boards from Ethiopia and Somalia. Both sets feature a handle with a hole.

Fig. 15: Qur’anic board from Mauritania N° 9305 © Sam Fogg.

Fig. 16: Qur’anic board from Southern Morroco N° 11987001 © Sam Fogg.



Type 3 (figs. 17–18): Study boards from Somalia. The shape of the board is narrow and greatly elongated along the vertical axis. There can be single- and double-legged boards, as well as single- and double-headed boards. The script is relatively large, clear, and primitive on all of the boards examined; it betrays the non-professional hand of a pupil. It is apparent that the ink has been washed off repeatedly: one can see through to the bottom layer, plus there is a black tincture on the surface of the board which usually results from ink. The board is not straight but tilted. This is prob-ably because wood is rather expensive and they use any wooden tablet available no matter what its quality. The single leg allows the rotation of the board during the class exercise. The student pushes the leg firmly into the ground: it is much easier to work it this way than to hold it horizontally on one’s knees; also, the ink dries much faster and the hands do not get dirty as it is possible to reverse the board at any time. On the other hand, double-legged boards require repositioning, but they are better suited for practicing calligraphy. The boards from Somalia are the simplest ones among all the local groups examined; their sole purpose is to serve as training material in the Qur’anic school.

Type 4 (fig. 19): Study boards from Ethiopia. The shape of the board is more ‘tradi-tional’: a wide rectangle with a single handle on top. These boards can have one or two legs. The proportions are similar to the boards from Nigeria and Western Sudan, 1:1.8.

Fig. 17: Qur’anic board from Somalia N° 12304 © Sam Fogg.

Fig. 18: Qur’anic board from Somalia N° 1770 © Sam Fogg.


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All four types (1–4) of the Qur’anic board have a vertical format.

Proportions (width:height): – Somalia: 1:5, 1:8, 1:4.5 – Ethiopia: 1:1.8 – Western Sudan (or Nigerian type): 1:1.8 – Sothern Morocco and Mauritania: 1:5, 1:3

3.2 Further Observations

The proportions of the Ethiopian boards are identical: the size varies by 5 cm at most, while maintaining the same width-to-height ratio. The height of Somalian boards varies from 80 to 130 cm, and these boards are greatly elongated.

The number and size of the letters differ from one study board to another. This means that there is no universal manufacturing canon, in contrast with the festive board allo zanyyana. On some boards the handwriting is large, like in copy-books, whereas on other boards it is small. Excepting the boards from Nigeria (the so-called Western Sudanic or Nigerian type—Type 1), almost all the samples are the non-ornamented boards used for study. On the Western Sudanic board, the zayyana ornament and the text have been washed away.

Fig. 19: Qur’anic board from Ethiopia N° 9569 © Sam Fogg.



Ethiopian boards all have the proportions 1:1.8; the height is almost twice the width. One possible conclusion is that there may be a formal rule behind this. In Northern Nigeria, the requirements for format, size, ornamentation, and script are fairly strict, whereas in Ethiopia and Somalia the rather primitive style indicates the hand of an unprofessional crafter.

The two boards from Nigeria/Western Sudan fall exactly into the type described by Hassan in his study; one can argue therefore that these two boards (N° 2 and N° 4) are typical alluna. The only difference is in the type of script used: it is another version of the Maghribī rather than Hausa hand; this script is not as geometrical and angular and has no sharp diagonals in the loops.

3.3 Boards from the Musée du quai Branly (figs. 20–24)

The collection consists of 114 Qur’anic boards from West Africa and the Maghrib.

For this article, five examples of the local types have been selected:

(1) (2)

Fig. 20: Board from Mauritania, Musée du quai Branly Inv. N° 74.1962.0.158 © Musée du quai Branly.

Fig. 21: Board from Morroco, Musée du quai Branly Inv. N° 74.1962.0.148 © Musée du quai Branly.


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Fig. 23: a–b. Board from Timbuktu, Musée du quai Branly Inv. N° 74.1962.0.1049 © Musée du quai Branly.

Fig. 22: Board from Morroco, Musée du quai Branly Inv. N° 74.1962.0.127 © Musée du quai Branly.

(3)



The most interesting board is N° 73.1963.0.268 from Hausa, Nigeria (fig. 24a–b). It is catalogued as a ‘Planchette pyrogravée’ rather than a ‘Qur’anic board,’ most likely because its distinct ritual character goes beyond Islamic usage.

The majority of the boards in this museum collection are localized to North Africa/Maghrib. Most were manufactured in Morocco and Algeria, but there are also a number of specimens from Mali, Nigeria, Sudan, Guinea, Somalia, Senegal, Madagas-car and the Comoro Islands. All of the boards have a vertical format.

The prevailing ornamental motifs on these boards are the following: geomet-ric (cosmogonic ornaments with solar characteristics—rectangle and circle-centred compositions), vegetative (floral motifs), architectural and carpet motifs. Among the architectural motifs, ornaments of a stylized arch/prayer niche (miḥrāb) are present.

One of the most common decorative patterns on the Moroccan boards is the solar palmette and the reverse swastika. Some boards feature no ornaments (e.g., from Mauritania). A number of boards feature no text from the Holy Qur’an, for example those labeled ‘mystical’ or ‘ritual’ boards. In Nigeria and Sudan, the most popular ornaments belong to the carpet type (allo zayyan/charafa).

After carefully examining the collection from the Musée du quai Branly, I have arrived at the following regional classification: boards from Western Sudan and Nigeria; Moroccan boards; boards from Mauritania; boards from Ethiopia; boards from Somalia, and boards from Mali. Within each type, one can identify further subtypes. All the boards come from the period of the 1st half of the 14th century Hijri/late 19 th and early 20th century CE.

The specific characteristics of these groups are as follows: – Moroccan boards are easily identifiable by the white couch and the vertical rec-

tangular or almost square-like shape. These boards are richly decorated. They are mostly festive boards with ornamentation similar to the manuscripts, including the ‘unwān.

Fig. 24: a–b. Board from Hausa/Nigeria, Musée du quai Branly Inv. N° 73.1963.0.268 © Musée du quai Branly.

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268 Anastasia Grib

– There are different subtypes of Moroccan boards, based on ornamentation: (а) architectural boards, (b) vegetative-cosmogonic boards (featuring bright, local colours in oil paint), (c) boards resembling bookbinding and lacquers, and (d) boards decorated predominantly with text.

– Boards without a couch represent the traditions of Somalia, Guinea (Futa-Djalon), and Djibuti. These boards are also typical for the Fulani tradition.

– Narrow, vertically elongated boards come from Mali, Mauritania, Algeria, the Comoro Islands, Madagascar, and Guinea.

– Malian boards (from Timbuktu) can be distinguished by (1) shape: these are small-size boards with a single leg in the middle of the base; (2) decoration: the board drawings are in monochrome and consist of cosmogonic symbols (the sun, crescent, and stars) as well as vegetative elements—in addition to the Qur’anic text; on some boards ornaments are painted in colour; (3) the script is non-cal-ligraphic.

Furthermore, non-decorated boards are always study boards rather than festive boards. Some boards feature a special ‘plaiting’ ornamental motif.

Board N° 74.1962.0.127 features a remarkable Temple Image (fig. 22) that deserves special discussion. The board comes from Fes in Morocco, and it combines all the ornamental types discussed earlier: architectural, geometric (cosmogonic symbols), vegetative, and calligraphic. While the composition on the board is pictorial in nature, it still follows the ‘carpet’ type. The board was made in the first half of the 14th century Hijri/early 20th century CE. The wood is covered with white couch. The text is written in brown ink. The illumination has been done in natural blue and red but the colours have faded. The board has a vertical format, and its size is 28.5 x 40.6 x 1.12 cm. There is no handle; on the top of the board there is a hole for hanging.

The board is decorated with a Temple Image of a common type: an arch between two columns marks off a complex composition representing an inner court of a mosque. The composition consists of three levels: (1) upper level: a minaret and roofs; (2) lower level: a pool for ritual washing in the centre of a court; (3) central level: connecting the previous two, shown in perspective. The two columns have ornaments and are painted in colour. The background within the composition is completely filled with text. The composition has a square-like rectangular frame filled with ornaments. More specifically, the frame is crowned by eight six-pointed stars, and above the frame there is a double Basmala inscription filling the empty space. On the reverse side of the board there are Qur’anic verses.



3.4 Exceptions from the Main Typology

3.4.1 The ‘Brooklyn Board’ (fig. 25a–e)

The collection of the Brooklyn Museum in New York City contains a rather unique Qur’anic board with zoomorphic and anthropomorphic images. The museum has listed the board’s place of origin as Sudan, probably based on its place of purchase rather than the type of script, format, or decoration. As I have argued elsewhere,21 the board belongs rather to the sacred caves in Marghi, Nigeria. I base my conclusion on a consideration of the text and ornaments, as well as the similarities between the images on the board and in rock graffiti in that particular area. As I have suggested, ornament can function as an ex libris of the sacred place where the object was manu-factured and/or stored. I call this a genizah symbol (see above).

On the front of the board there are images of scorpions, one snake, and five tents. The tents may refer to a wedding camp, which would be further indicated by the flagpoles; on the other hand, the five triangles could be a schematic depiction of the ‘leper hand’ motif. The front of the board (fig. 25a) contains a fragment of the 97th Sūra al-Qadr, ‘the Night of Power’ (fig. 25c).22 The textile ornament zayyana also occurs on the front of the board, framing the Sūra.

On the reverse side of the board (fig. 25b; fig. 25d), there are images of hunters as well as zoomorphic images including scorpions. Horsemen pursue an antelope and a giraffe (or it may be an ostrich). In West Africa, scorpions and snakes (fig. 25e) are frequently used as protective symbols against the evil eye.

The Brooklyn board exemplifies the phenomenon of the Islamic ‘intrusion’ into the field of indigenous ritual, and vice versa, thus forming a syncretic artistic language. Anthropomorphic and zoomorphic images circumvent the traditional Islamic ban on images within the domain of the sacred, including the Qur’anic text. This prohibition does not seem to apply to African Qur’anic boards, probably because they are not deemed to be exclusively Islamic objects.

21 See Grib 2009a, 22–34.22 Sūra al-Qadr is commonly used for protection, which includes marriage and engagement cere-monies. This also points to the Marghi region, because of the mba wedding ceremony. Since students would never write this particular Sūra in a zayyana-like fashion, the board does not have an educa-tional function. Furthermore, students are not allowed to put images on a training allo so as to distin-guish them from a true master-healer. Apart from this, there are ‘Ya Fattah, Ya ‘Alim,’ the names of God (’asmā’ al-ḥusnā) written on the top, which also speaks of a ritual purpose for this particular board.


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Fig. 25: a–e. The ‘Brooklyn Board’, Brooklyn Museum Inv. N° 22.231 (a–b © Brooklyn Museum; c–e © Anastasia Grib).



The ornamentation on the board falls into three types:1. the traditional ‘carpet page’ ornament, which is a version of the zayyana orna-

ment;2. the ‘Temple Image’ in the shape of a wedding camp (the second protective

meaning here is ‘leper hand’ or a modified khamsa);3. zoomorphic and anthropomorphic images like the ones on the rock graffiti:

according to Le Quellec, their iconography dates back to the Neolithic period.The Qur’anic text does not seem to belong in this particular decorative context. It was difficult to provide an accurate point of origin for the board, probably because the elements are painted chaotically and seem to be following their own internal logic. Yet one may argue, as I did, that the images from both sides of the board belong to the ‘Nigerian graphic repertoire’. I have also noticed that these images are akin to those found among rock graffiti in the Marghi region of Nigeria, namely:

– the hunting scene, – snakes and scorpions, – the man with a spear (modified to a man with a flagpole).23

While the area with the graffiti covers over 400 sq. km, the Brooklyn board may have been manufactured near the villages of Uvu and Wondi, where there is a record of an mba ceremony from the year 1962.24 As described by Le Quellec, there were a total of about ten caves with images belonging to the ‘Nigerian graphic repertoire’; these images were directly involved in the mba ceremony, being drawn on the walls of the cave after the procession. Similar caves exist in Birnin Kudu. Two of the depictions from the caves of Rumfar Kurosha in Marghi have been interpreted by Le Quellec as boards from Qur’anic schools.25

3.4.2 Planchette Pyrogravée from the Musée du Quai Branly, Inv. N° 73.1963.0.268 (fig. 24a–b).

In the collection of the Musée du quai Branly there is only one board attributed to the Hausa region in Nigeria, yet the format and the decoration of the board are not typical for this particular region.

The board has a markedly ritual, non-Qur’anic character. The text is absent, but there is a series of nicely done images consisting of animals, scorpions, and human beings. All of these come as couples with their apparent gender features, both male and female.

23 Grib 2009a, 32.24 Vaughan 1962, 49–52.25 Le Quellec 2004, 77.


272 Anastasia Grib

Fig. 26: Nigerian board from the collection of the Musée du quai Branly N° 71.1963.2.265 © Anasta-sia Grib (Courtesy: Musée du quai Branly).



One may see a connection with the ‘Nigerian graphic repertoire’, as one does on the board from the Brooklyn museum. I therefore believe this board to have originated in the Ceremony Mountains in the Marghi region.

The zoomorphic and anthropomorphic images are similar to the ones on the Brook-lyn board, but the character of these images is different, including their silhouettes, proportions, technique (etched drawing on the board from the Musée du quai Branly vs. ink on the Brooklyn board), arrangement of figures (ordered procession with all the creatures presented as couples on the board from the Musée du quai Branly vs. chaotic composition and a Qur’anic text on the Brooklyn board). In other words, the depictions on the board from the Musée du quai Branly point to its ritual purpose and use.

The two boards reproduce the images that occur frequently in Nigerian (Yoruba and Hausa) wedding textiles, images of animals, insects, and human beings. On the other hand, wedding cloth can also feature images of the boards. This cross-use demon-strates the direct involvement of the board in wedding ceremonies.

To support my theory that both the Brooklyn board and the Planchette pyro-gravée come from the Marghi region one can refer to yet another Nigerian board from the collection of the Musée du quai Branly (fig. 26). The board features the brownish Nigerian ink, a typical Nigerian zayyana decoration, and iconography similar to that of the Brooklyn board: a hunter, a snake and a tent.

4 Qur’anic Boards from West and North Africa: A Summarized Classification of Major Types

Table 1: Boards from Morocco

Local Type Format Material/treatment

Handle Decoration/illumination

boards from Morocco

vertical format, almost square in size

white couch most have no handle, but there is a special hole for hanging in the upper section of the board

rich in decoration; decora-tion matches illumination of the Qur’anic manuscripts from the same region; use of ‘unwān


274 Anastasia Grib

Subtypesboards differ by the style of decoration and by orna-mental motifs

(а) architec-tural

the reduced Temple Image

(b) vegeta-tive-cosmog-onic

bright, local colours, oil

(c) similar to the binding cover

background with the orna-mental filling

decoration resembles laquer bindings (with a diamond-shape in the centre of the ornamental field)

(d) training monochrome colours prevail

less decorated than other subtypes; the main back-ground is filled with the text

Table 2: Boards from Mali

Local type Format Material/treatment

Handle/base in the shape of supportive legs

Decoration/illumination

boards from Mali

small format no couch; in a number of boards ornaments are filled with coloured pigments

a comfort-able long conic handle extending from the centre of the base; rounded top is frequent

monochrome cosmogonic symbols (solar symbols, crescent, and stars) and vegetative elements side by side with Qur’anic text; non-calligraphic script (used in training); motifs: ‘plaiting’ (frequently)

Subtypesboards differ by format only

(a) narrow, verti-cal, elongated

(b) small format



Table 3: Boards from Mauritania




boards from Mauritania

narrow, vertically elongated; the shape is not always symmetrical

no couch smoothly rounded base; long thin handle with a hole for hanging; no additional festive deco-rations on the handle

no decoration

Table 4: Boards from Nigeria


Handle Decoration/illumination

boards from Nigeria (also identified as the Western Sūdānī type)

vertical symmetrical format, rec-tangular; pro-portions 1:1.8 (width:height)

additional decorative elements are attached to the handle; such elements are manufac-tured from a different material, e.g., leather, wood, or bone; the wood is pol-ished

there is a handle; the base has legs; there is no hole for hanging

fine work

Subtypesboards differ by decoration, shape and ornamental motifs

Hausa boards:


276 Anastasia Grib

(а) festive boards allo zayyana

bright, local colours, natural pig-ments

always topped by the saukar fari decoration (feast marking the comple-tion of study at a Qur’anic school)

zayyana in the form of a carpet ornament; the text is the first Sūra al-Fātiha and/or an excerpt from the second Sūra al-Baqara

(b) draft, train-ing boards allo

simple handle with no decor and no addi-tional top

no decoration, only quotes from the Qur’an including drafts

Ritual boards (Marghi)

vertical and horizontal boards

natural colours, brown ink

zoomorphic and anthropo-morphic images

Table 5: Boards from Somalia




boards from Somalia

narrow, vertically elongated

no couch handle has a hole for hanging

study boards without orna-mentation; the most basic type of QB

Subtypesboards differ by the number of legs and handles

(a) two legs and two handles

(b) single leg and single handle



Table 6: Boards from Ethiopia




boards from Ethiopia

‘traditional’ shape (vertical and wide), proportions 1:1.8 (w:h)

no couch; darkened due to washing off the ink

handle with hole for hanging

study boards without orna-mentation

Subtypesboards differ by the quantity of legs

(a) two legs

(b) single leg

Conclusions – In West and North Africa, one finds a semantic unity between two main types of

objects belonging to the Material culture of the Qur’an: the Qur’anic manuscripts and the Qur’anic boards.

– The shape of QB is determined by its function. – The QB is the material symbol of the Temple and the material image of the Text/

the Word. – There are several types of ornamentation: architectural, geometric, carpet, figu-

rative. An additional type of ornament is floral/vegetative. – Motifs on both Qur’anic manuscripts and Qur’anic boards can be linked to local

religious practices. – The function of the cave is as a genizah, a repository of sacred objects including

the QB. The place-tag is ‘attached’ to the manuscript and board by means of an ornament, which serves as the functional analogue of an ex libris in a book.

– Anthropomorphic and zoomorphic images on Hausa Qur’anic boards belong to the ‘Nigerian graphic repertoire’.


278 Anastasia Grib

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